Our house is up for sale!In Fairview Heights.We're asking $135,503...but we'd like to sell soon so we'd be flexible with the price.The reason we're selling is because we are moving to Edwardsville...closer to where I work, and the wife wanted a LOT of land ...and we break ground soon.

We put the house on realtor.com last week.REALTOR.COM LINKBut it is for sale by owner.We're willing to work with a realtor if you have one.

It's a 3 bedroom, 2 full bath, 1 car garage, central air... approx. 1600sq. ft., which includes a partially finished walk-out basement and spacious rooms. The utility area is nice and big, with plenty of room for washer & dryer, workbench, storage, etc. It has vaulted ceilings in the kitchen, dining area and living room.

The house is located on a dead end street with little traffic, close to everything in Fairview Heights (mall, shopping, restaurants, movies), close to Hwy. 64...15 minutes from downtown St. Louis.

This is a well maintained home that was essentially brand new in 2001 when we purchased it because the previous owner bought it to fix it up and sell it...and he gutted it and replaced EVERYTHING. All new in 2001: carpet, tile, cabinets, plumbing, ducts, a/c, furnace, interior doors, trim, etc.

We added numerous additions, including landscaping retaining wall flower beds in front and back, a large concrete patio in the backyard, a two-level deck (we added on the second level), a whole-house humidifier (nice in winter), concrete sidewalk on side of house from driveway to backyard, new roof a few years ago, and a wooden picket fence in backyard, and various other small improvements such as new light fixtures and bathroom vent fans.

We tilled and reseeded the front and back yards after we moved in because the grass was pretty weeded and thin when we bought the place. It's a really good yard now.If you have a dog, there is a killer setup for dogs. We installed a dog door in the basement window under the deck, and I built a ramp for them that goes down into the utility room where their beds and water bowls are. It's great because you can be gone all day and not have to worry about them being outside in the heat or cold. One of the best things I have ever done.

Most of the rooms were painted last year, and the rest were painted a few years ago.It's a great starter home or home for a small family. There really isn't anything to fix, and like I said, we took good care of it and put a lot of work into additions and whatnot.

We're having an open house on Sunday, September 7th from 1-4pm.If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask.

Yeah, for some reason, they say if you put a strange number on the end instead of rounding it off, you get a better response.So whatever...worth a shot.

Funny story on the house...Last week we had a couple come look at the house and when they came over they said they had just gotten out of a contract on another house because the seller refused to fix some major problems, including a huge mold problem that was discovered during inspection.So we're showing them around, and they absolutely loved our house. They were here maybe 20 minutes and offered us our asking price.So, I thought...cool.

They kept talking about how glad they were that they had gotten out of the previous contract and saw our house on craigslist.com.So, they signed a purchase agreement with us and they were going to talk to their realtor and they would contact us to get together, sign a contract and give us earnest money and all of that good stuff.

The next day, the couple called us in tears...they said they couldn't get out of their previous contract because the seller had agreed to fix the problems with the house.So now, they have to buy a house that they no longer wanted.Ouch. I feel sorry for them.

I'm thinking their realtor called that seller and convinced him to fix the problems since she was getting a better commission on that sale than if the couple had bought our home.

Yeah, for some reason, they say if you put a strange number on the end instead of rounding it off, you get a better response.So whatever...worth a shot.

You could've made it $135,531 to make it a palindrome.

Bummer about the couple that wanted to buy. When we moved to Denver we sold our house in Dallas empty, and we had an offer before we'd even gotten to Denver and unpacked. Our realtor was freaking out because she couldn't reach us and we hadn't called her yet. She was trying to call our old home phone number in Dallas (strangely it was disconnected, duh!) and it took her like 2 days to think of calling the cell phone number we gave her. Then she was mad at us for being hard to reach...

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cprice12 wrote:I'm thinking their realtor called that seller and convinced him to fix the problems since she was getting a better commission on that sale than if the couple had bought our home.

Did they have a buyer's agent? They don't get paid commission from the buyer, but the seller instead (just like a normal realtor), unless you mean the other house was more expensive and thus the commission bigger.

We had a buyer's agent when we bought our house and that's how it worked. Since I plan to be dead whenever my house is sold, I'm not too worried about paying commission then.

cprice12 wrote:I'm thinking their realtor called that seller and convinced him to fix the problems since she was getting a better commission on that sale than if the couple had bought our home.

Did they have a buyer's agent? They don't get paid commission from the buyer, but the seller instead (just like a normal realtor), unless you mean the other house was more expensive and thus the commission bigger.

We had a buyer's agent when we bought our house and that's how it worked. Since I plan to be dead whenever my house is sold, I'm not too worried about paying commission then.

No, the other house was less expensive than ours. And they were going through some sort of assisted loan program. And we agreed to help with closing costs, but since they had a realtor, our portion of the closing costs would then go to realtor fees, which we negotiated at something like 3.5%...or something. It was goofy. All I know is, the realtor was probably going to make more on the other sale for some reason...at least that is how it was explained to me.My wife took the phone call while I was at work....so you can ask her about it if you want.

Well, we have a buyer.Same couple that wanted the house weeks ago but were stuck in another contract.They ended up getting a lawyer and got out of the contract somehow and they were told they could go forward with buying our house.Nice couple. I'm glad they are buying it.

Anyway...They had their inspector show up today and the house did well.They are coming over on Sunday evening to sign the contract.Hopefully everything goes smoothly.

There is one hitch.They are asking if we can close on Oct. 3rd because they need to be out of where they are by then. Wow. That's only a few weeks away.We're flexible and all...and if the title company is ok with closing on Oct. 3rd, it's going to be a hectic next few weeks getting all of our stuff together.

Prngr44 wrote:If you're being this flexible maybe they'll be a little flexible on getting your stuff out da house.

Congrats on getting the buyer though!

Thanks.

And we did the paperwork tonight...so they are under contract to buy the house.Funny story. We sat down to negotiate the price of the house...we were asking $135,503...and we sold it for $136,000. Reason being, we chipped in on their closing costs, so we upped the asking price a bit to offset some of that cost, they came back with another offer, which was still above our asking price...and we agreed on that.We ended up coming out $4000 over the minimum we wanted to net after all fees and closing costs...so we're happy.

I guess the last hurdle to clear is the appraiser, who will be here this week.

And yeah, we need to be out by Oct. 3rd...which isn't a huge deal. Three weeks won't be that bad...it's just weird to think we'll be out of the house in only three weeks.

I get to call our contractor tomorrow and tell him to get started on the driveway and bridge over the lake. And so it begins...finally.

If I can't find a job upgrade soon I will be looking for new housing, new wife, etc..

Thanks.It's been a few weeks now and we're still waiting on paperwork and the plans to be appraised...and we were told they were going to be done by the 21st..but no word yet. It's friggin' taking forever and it's the last thing that needs to be done before we start building.It's going to be a rush to get the house shelled before the winter weather hits...hopefully it holds off as long as possible...or maybe we'll have a mild winter.Oh well...it will get done...it's just going to take longer. Damn appraisers.